1. Technical Field
This disclosure relates to electronic systems, and more particularly, to communications links involving various frame sizes used for communications between different agents of an electronic system.
2. Description of the Related Art
In computers and other electronic systems, a significant amount of communications between the various agents thereof occurs during normal operation.
Such communications may include chip-to-chip communications as well as intra-chip communications between functional units implemented thereon.
Some communications may be conducted in parallel, i.e. by concurrently transmitting a number of bits in a unit of information. Other communications may be conducted serially, i.e., transmitting bits consecutively in a predetermined order. In some cases, chip-to-chip communications may be conducted serially over high-speed differential communications links, even though the information on-chip is transferred in parallel. The chips on each side of the serial communications link may include respective functional circuitry known as a serializer-deserializer (SERDES). The transmitting chip may convert the parallel data into serial data, while the receiving chip may convert the received serial data back into parallel data. When serially transmitted, the data may be transferred in a frame of a specified size. The frame size may differ from the frame size of the data when transferred in parallel on-chip. Accordingly, each SERDES may include circuitry to convert the data between a serial frame size, for transmission over the serial link, and a parallel frame size, for transmission on-chip.